hexyl Documentation

Technical Documentation: sharkdp/hexyl

ℹ️ Provenance: Multi-Tier Ingestion · CodeWiki Reference

Overview (`README.md`) Copy Section

hexyl is a hex viewer for the terminal. It uses a colored output to distinguish different categories
of bytes (NULL bytes, printable ASCII characters, ASCII whitespace characters, other ASCII characters and non-ASCII).

Preview Copy Chapter

Installation Copy Chapter

On Ubuntu Copy Section

... and other Debian-based Linux distributions.

If you run Ubuntu 19.10 (Eoan Ermine) or newer, you can install the officially maintained package:

sudo apt install hexyl

If you use an older version of Ubuntu, you can download
the latest .deb package from the release page and install it via:

sudo dpkg -i hexyl_0.15.0_amd64.deb  # adapt version number and architecture

On Debian Copy Section

If you run Debian Buster or newer, you can install the officially maintained Debian package:

sudo apt-get install hexyl

If you run an older version of Debian, see above for instructions on how to
manually install hexyl.

On Fedora Copy Section

If you run Fedora 35 or newer, you can install the officially maintained Fedora package:

sudo dnf install hexyl

On Arch Linux Copy Section

You can install hexyl from the official package repository:

pacman -S hexyl

On Void Linux Copy Section

xbps-install hexyl

On Gentoo Linux Copy Section

Available in dm9pZCAq overlay

sudo eselect repository enable dm9pZCAq
sudo emerge --sync dm9pZCAq
sudo emerge sys-apps/hexyl::dm9pZCAq

On macOS Copy Section

Via Homebrew:

brew install hexyl

...or via MacPorts:

sudo port install hexyl

On FreeBSD Copy Section

pkg install hexyl

On NetBSD Copy Section

pkgin install hexyl

On OpenBSD Copy Section

doas pkg_add hexyl

on Termux Copy Section

pkg install hexyl

or

apt install hexyl

Via Nix Copy Section

nix-env -i hexyl

Via Guix Copy Section

guix package -i hexyl

Or add the hexyl package in the list of packages to be installed in your system configuration (e.g., /etc/config.scm).

On other distributions Copy Section

Check out the release page for binary builds.

On Windows Copy Section

Check out the release page for binary builds.
Alternatively, install from source via cargo, snap or scoop (see below).
Make sure that you use a terminal that supports ANSI escape sequences (like ConHost v2 since Windows 10 1703
or Windows Terminal since Windows 10 1903).

Via cargo Copy Section

If you have Rust 1.56 or higher, you can install hexyl from source via cargo:

cargo install hexyl

Alternatively, you can install hexyl directly from the repository by using:

git clone https://github.com/sharkdp/hexyl
cargo install --path ./hexyl

Note: To convert the man page, you will need Pandoc.

You can convert from Markdown by using (in the project root):

pandoc -s -f markdown -t man -o ./doc/hexyl.1 ./doc/hexyl.1.md

Via snap package Copy Section

sudo snap install hexyl

Get it from the Snap Store

Via [Scoop](https://scoop.sh) Copy Section

scoop install hexyl

Via [X-CMD](https://x-cmd.com) Copy Section

x env use hexyl

Configuration Copy Chapter

hexyl colors can be configured via environment variables. The variables used are as follows:

• HEXYL_COLOR_ASCII_PRINTABLE: Any non-whitespace printable ASCII character
• HEXYL_COLOR_ASCII_WHITESPACE: Whitespace such as space or newline (only visible in middle panel with byte values)
• HEXYL_COLOR_ASCII_OTHER: Any other ASCII character (< 0x80) besides null
• HEXYL_COLOR_NULL: The null byte (0x00)
• HEXYL_COLOR_NONASCII: Any non-ASCII byte (> 0x7F)
• HEXYL_COLOR_OFFSET: The lefthand file offset

The colors can be any of the 8 standard terminal colors: black, blue, cyan, green, magenta, red,
yellow and white. The "bright" variants are also supported (e.g., bright blue). Additionally, you can use
the RGB hex format, #abcdef. For example, HEXYL_COLOR_ASCII_PRINTABLE=blue HEXYL_COLOR_ASCII_WHITESPACE="bright green" HEXYL_COLOR_ASCII_OTHER="#ff7f99".

License Copy Chapter

Licensed under either of

• Apache License, Version 2.0, (LICENSE-APACHE or https://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0)
• MIT license (LICENSE-MIT or https://opensource.org/licenses/MIT)

at your option.

Doc Hexyl.1 (`doc/hexyl.1.md`) Copy Section

% HEXYL(1) hexyl 0.12.0 | General Commands Manual
%
% 2022-12-05

NAME

hexyl - a command-line hex viewer

SYNOPSIS

hexyl [OPTIONS] [FILE]

DESCRIPTION

hexyl is a simple hex viewer for the terminal.
It uses a colored output to distinguish different categories of bytes (NULL
bytes, printable ASCII characters, ASCII whitespace characters, other ASCII
characters and non-ASCII).

POSITIONAL ARGUMENTS

FILE
: The file to display.
If no FILE argument is given, read from STDIN.

OPTIONS

-n, --length N
: Only read N bytes from the input.
The N argument can also include a unit with a decimal prefix (kB, MB, ..)
or binary prefix (kiB, MiB, ..), or can be specified using a hex number.

Examples:

:   

    Read the first 64 bytes:
    :   $ **hexyl \--length=64**

    Read the first 4 kibibytes:
    :   $ **hexyl \--length=4KiB**

    Read the first 255 bytes (specified using a hex number):
    :   $ **hexyl \--length=0xff**

-c, --bytes N
: An alias for -n/--length.

-l N
: Yet another alias for -n/--length.

-s, --skip N
: Skip the first N bytes of the input.
The N argument can also include a unit (see --length for details).
A negative value is valid and will seek from the end of the file.

--block-size SIZE
: Sets the size of the block unit to SIZE (default is 512).

Examples:

:   

    Sets the block size to 1024 bytes:
    :   $ **hexyl \--block-size=1024 \--length=5block**

    Sets the block size to 4 kilobytes:
    :   $ **hexyl \--block-size=4kB \--length=2block**

-v, --no-squeezing
: Displays all input data.
Otherwise any number of groups of output lines which would be identical to
the preceding group of lines, are replaced with a line comprised of a
single asterisk.

--color WHEN
: When to use colors.
The auto-mode only displays colors if the output goes to an interactive
terminal.

Possible values:

:   - **always** (default)
    - **auto**
    - **never**

--border STYLE
: Whether to draw a border with Unicode characters, ASCII characters, or none
at all.

Possible values:

:   - **unicode** (default)
    - **ascii**
    - **none**

-o, --display-offset N
: Add N bytes to the displayed file position.
The N argument can also include a unit (see --length for details).
A negative value is valid and calculates an offset relative to the end of
the file.

-h, --help
: Prints help information.

-V, --version
: Prints version information.

ENVIRONMENT VARIABLES

hexyl colors can be configured via environment variables. The variables used are as follows:

: - HEXYL_COLOR_ASCII_PRINTABLE: Any non-whitespace printable ASCII character
- HEXYL_COLOR_ASCII_WHITESPACE: Whitespace such as space or newline (only visible in middle panel with byte values)
- HEXYL_COLOR_ASCII_OTHER: Any other ASCII character (< 0x80) besides null
- HEXYL_COLOR_NULL: The null byte (0x00)
- HEXYL_COLOR_NONASCII: Any non-ASCII byte (> 0x7F)
- HEXYL_COLOR_OFFSET: The lefthand file offset

The colors can be any of the 8 standard terminal colors: black, blue, cyan, green, magenta, red,
yellow and white. The "bright" variants are also supported (e.g., bright blue). Additionally, you can use
the RGB hex format, #abcdef. For example, HEXYL_COLOR_ASCII_PRINTABLE=blue HEXYL_COLOR_ASCII_WHITESPACE="bright green"
HEXYL_COLOR_ASCII_OTHER="#ff7f99".

NOTES

Source repository:
: https://github.com/sharkdp/hexyl

EXAMPLES

Print a given file:
: $ hexyl small.png

Print and view a given file in the terminal pager:
: $ hexyl big.png | less -r

Print the first 256 bytes of a given special file:
: $ hexyl -n 256 /dev/urandom

AUTHORS

hexyl was written by David Peter [email protected].

REPORTING BUGS

Bugs can be reported on GitHub at:
: https://github.com/sharkdp/hexyl/issues

COPYRIGHT

hexyl is dual-licensed under:

: - Apache License 2.0 (https://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0)
- MIT License (https://opensource.org/licenses/MIT)

SEE ALSO

hexdump(1), xxd(1)

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• Canonical Reference: https://codewiki.google/github.com/sharkdp/hexyl